Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-12-21
and see how far the free ballot and the
fair count" obtain in New Hampshire,
Connecticut, and Rhode Island for in
sfanee
or One blood.
TO The Editor Of the Dispatch.

TO The Editor Of the Dispatch:
In your issue OF December 18th you
quote brief paragraph from the Boston
Herald and then add some editorial
comments, to the effect that the words OF
our King James's Bible, "and hath
made of one blood all nations of men for
TO dwell on all the face OF the earth, do
not occur in the Revised Version, the
word "blood" being omitted. Your
statement is true, but is it the whole
truth which ought to be pre-
sented to the minds Of your readers
on this important subject? 1t had
long been known that the Revised
Version of 1881 sedulously follows the
critical text Of the Greek Testament
issued in May 1881 under the editorship
of Rev. Drs. Westcott and Hort, OF
England. Learned and laborious as these
editors were, and valuable as their labor
of twenty-eight years on this work has
proved itself, yet they have adopted
rules worse than questionable as to
dealing with the manuscripts and other
evidences for the inspired text Of the
New Testament, and they have in some
cases applied their own rules so I'M
fortunately as to fall into manifest error.
The result has been that their work is
in some respects Objectionable and not
approved by the best scholarship OF the
age. The omission OF the word "blood "
(aim0tos) in Acts xvii, 26, is one OF
their errors, for which they present no
justification whatever in their {" Notes on
Select Readings in the second volume
of their work. Assuredly if they deemed
that the preponderant weight of au-
thority" on the manuscripts and other
evidences was against this word they
ought to have shown it to be so, as they
have done in other instances in which
their conclusions have been correct and
have been approved by the Christian
world. But they have not done SO,
doubtless because they had no reasons
for emitting this word "blood
(aimatos) which would have been
deemed satisfactory. That word blood "
is in the terfus receptus-the received
text of the New Testament published
under the editorship of Erasmus and the
Elzeyirs just about the time OF the Re-
formation. And that expression from
one blood "--er enOs GiDsatOs--is in the
critical editions of Griesbsch and
Mill and George Christian Knapp,
whose work was the result of the most
laborious and extended study. The
preponderant weight Of authority "
is strongly in favor of retaining The
word. In truth, without it we have
the anomaly of q numeral adjective
without a noun Westcott and Hort
are wrong there, and of course the Re-
vised Version, which follows them, is
wrong God has made "of one blood "
oil mankind, because all descend
from Adam. And this is the concfu-
sion of the highest scientific re-
searches OF the world, as Pritchard and
Professor Cabell have shown. Mott and
Gliddon's typos of mankind, and Senn-
tor Jones's speech against the Chinese
lin which he made the same point from
the Revised Version that the Dispatch has
mentioned) will avail very little against
Holy Scripture and true science.
X. r. H.
We beg leave to be excused from en-
gaging in a controversy on a scrptural
question with q learned Doctor of Di-
vinity.